On Thursday March 6th, Maryland Congressman Chris Van Hollen hosted a “town hall” to discuss issues with the general public.  One of the attendees was RMR & Associates President and CEO Robyn Sachs.  Robyn’s views on the event are below:

 

 

Hi Friends,

  A number of you asked about what happened at the Chris Van Hollen Town Hall last night. We did not get any good video but I will share with you my impressions and feel free to use any or all of it if you want to share with your groups:

  For the record, I’m a registered Democrat so I actually thought we might do some good through this meeting.

 Here goes:

My Town Hall meeting experience with Chris Van Hollen Last Night

(My overall feeling when I left the auditorium –) I’m offended, we are not all that stupid

  I attended the Chris Van Hollen Town Hall last night to, as they said on the invite, “express my concerns and ask questions because I represent you in Congress”. I’m a registered Democrat, I was actually hopeful that he meant it.

  Van Hollen then proceeded to lie for the next 2 hours. His prepared remarks covered 5 areas: 1) The Economy 2) the IRS targeting 3) Immigration Reform 4) Voting Rights and 5) Foreign Policy. The last hour of the meeting was Q&A. The handful of us who attended and wanted to ask important questions were avoided like the plague when they saw our hands raised. Rather then have a line-up where people could ask a question, they had “hired guns” with microphones picking and choosing who to call on, which was infuriating as many of us never got to speak. I finally shouted out a few things and that did get some response, but the format did not lend itself to hearing all concerns.

  One man sitting next to me, Lewis Porter, told me he witnessed massive Voter fraud in Baltimore City where he worked helping a candidate in 2012, he wanted to bring up the need for Voter I.D., but never got to ask his question.

  Overall, it was truly an affront to anyone who has been paying attention. The IRS Scandal was “silly, overzealous workers in Cincinnati who did stupid things”, What!? We now have e-mails disclosed this week that Lois Lerner, who took the 5th again this week, said “the Tea Party people are dangerous and we need to get those applications out of Cincy” — Does Chris Van Hollen not know this? Or was he just lying through his teeth? It was outrageous, I was just sitting there in amazement!

  Oh yes, and on “Immigration Reform” (as he called it), it’s very important you see, as “it will help the economy” per Van Hollen. Yet, when he talked about the Economy, he said “there are 3 people out there for every job” so that is why “it is imperative we extend unemployment benefits”. Yet in his Immigration talk, he said “We need to pass Immigration Reform because that will create more jobs and help the economy”. One audience member called him out on that hypocrisy and mentioned this conflict, Chris merely referred to a nonpartisan CBO Report. Really???

  I finally blurted out “how about enforcing the current laws”? He then stated the tired stat about Obama having more deportations, blah, blah, blah. I said “so why are ICE agents suing the Feds for not being able to do their jobs?” No real answer for that one.

  Folks, my overall impression is “the fix is in”. In my opinion, the points he covered really meant: 1) the Economy — More welfare and unemployment benefits are needed 2) IRS Targeting — Let the IRS Target our political enemies all they want 3) Immigration Reform — Import as many “future Democrats” as possible, while we still can, so we can win elections. 4) Voter Rights — Let anyone vote, whether they are eligible or not, voter rights actually means NO Voter I.D. at any cost, if not, YOU are a racist. 5) Foreign Policy — We are screwed as these are the people we’ve put into office to protect our National Security — YIKES!

  Overall, it was one of the worst experiences of my life. I have no faith whatsoever in our “Democratic Process”, the fix is in! I continue to feel our Republic is in great danger and it is time the American people wake up and get a clue. We need to start electing people who have integrity, I don’t care what party they are in, and we have to stop electing people who and will  lie to our faces and have -0- problem with that.